


perfect, now

by daneorange (adreamaloud)



Category: Skins (UK)
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-05-05
Updated: 2009-05-05
Packaged: 2017-10-18 18:55:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,974
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/192132
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/adreamaloud/pseuds/daneorange
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Soon, Emily finds herself living for mornings like this.</p>
            </blockquote>





	perfect, now

_i. don’t want to make a movement / too scared to breathe_

Soon, Emily finds herself living for morning afters like this, when she opens her eyes ahead of Naomi and is afforded a glimpse of what Naomi looks like when she’s at the edge of waking – too pure, actually, it kind of makes Emily recoil, at some point, as if to touch her were to somehow stain her. Somewhat.

But no matter. Emily knows how hard she’s fought for this, against Naomi’s stubborn insistence not to do any mornings after, rambling over and over about how it wasn’t her, about how it was completely out of character.

“Come on,” is how Emily begins saying it, carefully. “Really, I don’t care about fucking or coming or any of those carnal… things,” she pauses, stumbling on that last word even, and off Naomi’s smirk, Emily continues, more honestly now, “Really, all I want to do is wake up and see you.”

Emily would have wanted to smirk right back, really, at the speed with which Naomi’s grin is wiped off her face and replaced with some other sort of look, something softer, something warmer. Instead, she just reaches over, touching Naomi’s cheek and saying, “Is that alright with you?”

Naomi just nods, wordless.

*

That first morning after, Emily is awake first because she hasn’t slept, in the first place – not that she could have, anyway, after spending most of the night scalded, which is practically the only way to describe how it feels to be skin-to-skin with Naomi: A lot like burning, amazed even at how that word in itself is just simply lacking.

The moment Naomi wakes, she opens one eye a millisecond ahead of the other; Emily tries not to giggle as she says, “Good morning.”

Naomi makes a face, first thing, pulls back a little. “Were you watching me?”

“God no,” Emily says, rolling her eyes as she clears her throat, smiling slyly. Apparently, her voice does get a bit raspier in the morning, because apparently, it still could. “I was just, you know. Waking up in time.”

Naomi clears her throat herself. “So. Did you wake up nicely in time then?” she asks, and at this point Emily feels a hand gliding over her side, slowly, lightly. “Did you sleep well?”

“Fantastic.” Emily swallows hard at the lie, acutely aware that Naomi’s hand is inching higher, going around to smooth her back, then back in front again to stroke the valley between her breasts. “Are you working me up?”she asks boldly, half-sighing.

Naomi’s hand stops, abruptly. “God no,” she says, and Emily looks up just in time to catch the grin on Naomi’s face, the naughty twinkle in her eye, the shaft of sun that has slipped through the window, lighting the side of her face just *so*.

“Like hell you’re not,” she just says back, leaning in. Emily soon finds out how lovely it is to kiss in the morning, to part only for a moment of breath before diving in again – all this on infinite repeat, in various lengths. There are no questions about these comfortable silences, these gaps between mouthfuls of air. No questions, just desire.

*

 _ii. as deep as the sky under my skin_

Some days, Emily is unable to contain her hot flashes – the feel of Naomi’s skin, her lips, the way she takes in a bit of Emily’s flesh between her teeth, that ticklish feeling of her tongue. They come abruptly in the middle of the day, always out of nowhere - while she’s doing a house chore, while she’s talking to her parents, while Katie is speaking, while watching television. It’s insane, mostly, and Emily does her best to be excused, if need be, every time.

Mostly, they need no prompting. Like when she’s watching her mother tend to their garden, wrist-deep in the earth (Naomi was right here, on my hand, keeling this way, Emily’s thinking, and the way she sighs makes her mum go, Are you sick, darling?) or when she zones out right in the middle of a conversation with Katie in their bedroom, licking her lips absently upon remembrance of the most innocent of Naomi’s gestures (And Katie goes, Please, Ems, don’t do that, it’s disgusting.)

Once, on a group night-out, Emily lets her gaze linger a bit while longer at the hem of Naomi’s dress as they were standing right outside the club, their hands lazily intertwined.

When Naomi catches her, she just leans in and says, “You’ve got to stop looking at me like that, or else,” smiling conspiratorially even as she lights a cigarette, eyeing Emily evilly.

“Else what?” Emily leans closer, grazing the underside of Naomi’s ear briefly with her lower lip.

Naomi pulls back slightly, taking a hit casually before blowing to the side, and then, nodding to the direction of the entrance, “Well, you know.”

“I know what?”

“Come on,” says Naomi, still smiling evilly, tugging at Emily’s hand now, flicking the unfinished cigarette out on the street. The utter abandon in the gesture makes Emily’s breath hitch. “Let’s dance.”

A second later they’re in the club, in one of the darker corners, making out to loud music; Naomi’s hands all over the place, Emily’s arms firmly around Naomi, pulling tightly, as if to say, _Closer._

*

Some days, they hardly make it out of bed at all. Of course, they attribute it to hangover, to the fact that day was already breaking anyway when they stumbled into Naomi’s bed, severely high on several unnamed substances, not to mention bottles and bottles of alcohol.

“Are you coming down already?” asks Naomi, lying aside Emily, the both of them staring at the ceiling of Naomi’s bedroom for the nth time. Emily likes counting, actually, and if she weren’t this smashed, she’d know exactly, for sure. “What were those things anyway?”

Emily laughs at that – a hoarse, barely-there laugh that gives Naomi some kind of clue as to just how many the girl has had for the night. “I don’t fucking know,” Emily just says. Her hand strays right over Naomi’s on the bed. “Are you?”

When Naomi doesn’t answer, Emily turns right over to her side, propping her head on an elbow and watches: The way Naomi breathes when she is there and not there; the way her eyes move underneath her eyelids as she looks at the objects in her dreams; the way her lips softly, slowly part; the way sunshine slowly pours in, shockingly bright (It’s the fucken ‘shrooms, Emily groans inwardly), flooding into the room until it is unbearable that Emily has to burrow into the darkness of Naomi’s neck, inhaling her scent, her lullaby for the time being.

*

Upon waking that morning, Emily finds herself alone in bed. Naturally, she tells herself, fixing her hair, nearly heartbroken even, until her hand feels a scrap of paper trapped in her bow: Getting breakfast, it says, in Naomi’s unmistakable writing, signed with the letter N. Outside, the sun is so horribly bright it feels like it is burning right into Emily’s brain, but despite that, Emily struggles and smiles.

When Naomi returns half an hour later, she has coffee and donuts and sunglasses on. The sight makes Emily giggle, a little.

“What?” says Naomi, grinning herself. “Can’t a girl wear sunglasses in the aftermath of shrooms?”

Emily just says, “I suppose,” still chuckling, and then, “Come here.” And when Naomi does, Emily says, softer, “You look gorgeous in the morning.”

Naomi blushes a shade Emily has never seen before.

*

Still basking in the aftermath of chemicals, Naomi reaches out, touching Emily’s hair tentatively.

“Your hair’s burning so bright,” she just says, stroking and stroking.

*

There are five missed calls when Emily checks her mobile, all of them from Katie. Groaning, she asks Naomi what time it is, and in keeping with the theme, ‘Severely Smashed’, Naomi only answers vaguely. “Must be afternoon,” she just says.

As Emily prepares to leave, trying to dress up as if she’s not panicking, Naomi shifts on the bed and groans. “How’s your head?” she asks.

Emily shrugs. “Horrible. Yours?”

“Likewise,” and then, wincing, she looks up and flashes a smile Emily’s way. “I’ll see you tomorrow, then?”

The thought tides Emily over the walk home and the interrogation over the dinner table, through the trudge up the stairs and Katie’s unceasing blather and eventually into sleep, into which she falls, all too gladly.

*

Emily finds out soon enough about how one could only live without something for so long until the day it is introduced into one’s system. It’s much like that time she was introduced to cigarettes, to spliff, to vodka even – she remembers how there are mornings like this: When she wakes up, her eyes flare open and all she could think about is vice.

Not that Naomi’s a vice – she would not take that label happily, Emily thinks, as she showers that morning, taking off two days’ worth of grime off her skin, remembering how Naomi had worshipped this body somewhere along the way – the thought makes her shudder, the register of the word ‘worship’ in her head pushing her to hold onto the tile wall for support. She is suddenly shaking, and she thinks, Is this withdrawal, yet?

*

When she passes Katie on the way out, she asks, “Where you off to?” To which Emily answers, instantaneously, “Air,” without even looking back.

Emily is already turning the corner when the epiphany of the comparison hits her.

*

 _iii. blessed arms that hold you tight, freezing_

That next morning after, and the morning afters after that, Emily makes it a point to stay awake – this is why she likes it better when they’re somewhat sober, because she could last through the whole night completely conscious. (It doesn’t happen very often, really, because the only reason that works on the parentals is the reason that features the both of them smashed, but then again, sometimes they could get creative too.)

On such creative nights, Emily touches Naomi slowly, speeding up only upon request, not really as a deliberate attempt to tease, but rather as an exercise in memory-keeping: Sometimes, all Emily wants to do is remember – this dip, that swell, the curve on the underside of Naomi’s breasts; the way her stomach feels under Emily’s palm; the skin on the outside of Naomi’s thighs; how Naomi gasps when Emily skims her hand on the inside, leading to the beginning – no, to the end, but no – the beginning of everything, and this is where Emily’s memory begins to falter, always.

Emily closes her eyes tightly, believing that the absence of visuals would aid the remembrance of sensations, like a sort of adhesive – like, when she has her eyes closed, she could know exactly how the softness of Naomi’s skin is different from the softness of her lips, how the give of the flesh in the respective areas is different and/or the same. Like, when Emily has her eyes closed, she could know for certain the weight of Naomi's taste on her tongue, the precise name for this texture.

Emily Fitch wants the simple things – the pleasure of waking beside a warm body, the joy of kissing in the morning, then the whole remembering during the period in between that comes before the maddening wait.

But then, of course, Emily knows it will not last - perhaps, it will pass, or perhaps it will end, Emily does not know the method with which this will disappear, but the thing is that she knows - now it is here, but time will come when it won't be.

When she looks at Naomi in the morning, she reminds herself of all that. But then -- impending heartbreak notwithstanding -- that this could end doesn’t in any way stop her from feeling this, just the same. #

**Author's Note:**

> Skins, Naomi/Emily, 2,000 words.


End file.
